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Dan Hill's EQ Spotlight
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Journal of Asian American Studies Podcast
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Malcolm X and Black Nationalism
A Podcast Series about Polymath Robert Eisler
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About Dexter Fergie
Dexter Fergie is a doctoral student in US and global history at Northwestern University. His research examines the history of ideas, infrastructure, and international organizations.
NBN Episodes hosted by Dexter:
History
January 13, 2021
Whistleblowing Nation
The History of National Security Disclosures and the Cult of State Secrecy
Kaeten Mistry and Hannah Gurman
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
In the past decade, Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden became household names. They were celebrated by many as truth-tellers who blew the whistle on governmental abuses. Yet, in the eyes …
History
December 15, 2020
Ghosts of Sheridan Circle
How a Washington Assassination Brought Pinochet's Terror State to Justice
Alan McPherson
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
On September 21, 1976, a car bomb exploded in Washington DC, killing a former Chilean diplomat named Orlando Letelier and his American colleague Ronni Moffitt. The assassination was a cruel …
History
November 13, 2020
The United States of War
A Global History of America's Endless Conflicts, from Columbus to the Islamic State
David Vine
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Since its founding, the United States has been at peace for only eleven years. Across nearly two-and-a-half centuries, that’s a lot of war. In his new book, The United States …
American Studies
October 29, 2020
Dead Tree Media
Manufacturing the Newspaper in Twentieth-Century North America
Michael Stamm
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Michael Stamm’s book Dead Tree Media: Manufacturing the Newspaper in Twentieth-Century North America (Johns Hopkins UP, 2018) begins with the simple but thought-provoking premise that, not too long ago, newspapers …
American Studies
September 17, 2020
Oil Powers
A History of the US-Saudi Alliance
Victor McFarland
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
The relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia is a critical feature of the modern international system. It binds the global hegemon to a region on the other side …
American Studies
August 7, 2020
Just Like Us
The American Struggle to Understand Foreigners
Thomas Borstelmann
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
The American attitude towards outsiders has always been ambivalent. The United States, it is commonly said, is a nation of immigrants; today, it’s the most demographically diverse great power. But …
African Studies
June 26, 2020
The Diplomacy of Decolonisation
America, Britain, and the United Nations during the Congo Crisis, 1960-1964
Alanna O’Malley
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
In the summer of 1960, the Republic of the Congo won its independence from Belgium. Only one week later, however, Belgium had already dispatched paratroopers into the country and the …
British Studies
May 6, 2020
Liberalism at Large
The World According to 'The Economist'
Alexander Zevin
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
The Economist is a curious publication. It always takes a point of view (as opposed to the all-the-news-that’s-fit-to-print approach). It maintains a uniform voice (editors and writers are typically handpicked …
Communications
April 27, 2020
Of Privacy and Power
The Transatlantic Struggle over Freedom and Security
Abraham Newman and Henry Farrell
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
We live in an interconnected world. People, goods, and services leap across borders like never before. Terrorist organizations, like al-Qaida, and digital platforms, like Facebook, have gone global. But, if …
American Studies
April 10, 2020
Canada and the World since 1867
Asa McKercher
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
If you haven’t been able to tell by the way I pronounce the word “about,” I should probably let you know that I’m from Canada. And I have to make …
Australian and New Zealand Studies
April 3, 2020
Human Rights in Twentieth-Century Australia
Jon Piccini
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
After the Second World War, an Australian diplomat was one of eight people to draft the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights. And in the years that followed, Australians of many …
French Studies
March 4, 2020
Mecca of Revolution
Algeria, Decolonization, and the Third World Order
Jeffrey James Byrne
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
In his brilliant, category-smashing book, Mecca of Revolution: Algeria, Decolonization, and the Third World Order (Oxford University Press, 2016), Jeffrey James Byrne places Algeria at the center of many of …
American Studies
February 28, 2020
Barriers Down
How American Power and Free-Flow Policies Shaped Global Media
Diana Lemberg
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Since the 1940s, America’s relations with the rest of the world have been guided by the idea of promoting the free flow of information. It’s an idea that seems benign …
African Studies
January 15, 2020
The Colonial Politics of Global Health
France and the United Nations in Postwar Africa
Jessica Lynne Pearson
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
International organizations throw up several obstacles—their immense scale, their dry bureaucratic language—to the historian trying to piece together their past. In her book, The Colonial Politics of Global Health: France …
American Studies
November 22, 2019
Sorting Out the Mixed Economy
The Rise and Fall of Welfare and Developmental States in the Americas
Amy Offner
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
The neoliberal 1980s of austerity and privatization may appear as a break with the past—perhaps a model of government drawn up by libertarian economists. Not so, says Amy Offner in …
American Studies
September 13, 2019
Free Enterprise
An American History
Lawrence Glickman
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
“Free enterprise” is an everyday phrase that connotes an American common sense. It appears everywhere from political speeches to pop culture. And it is so central to the idea of …
American Studies
September 2, 2019
A Nation Forged by Crisis
A New American History
Jay Sexton
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
A popular myth in the American nationalist imaginary is that the country has been on a continued path of progress. Another is that the country’s history has been the self-realization …
American Studies
August 20, 2019
Clashing over Commerce
A History of US Trade Policy
Douglas A. Irwin
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Scholars of US history have treated trade policy in less than enthusiastic ways. One economic historian described tariffs as “extraordinarily uninteresting things unless related to the political events which give …
American Studies
August 13, 2019
Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America
Margaret O’Mara
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Seventy years ago, there was no Apple Campus or Googleplex. Silicon Valley itself didn’t even exist! The region was filled with sleepy towns, prune trees, and orange groves. Since then …
American Studies
June 18, 2019
Worldmaking
The Art and Science of American Diplomacy
David Milne
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
There are countless ways to study the history of U.S. foreign policy. David Milne, however, makes the case that it is “often best understood” as “intellectual history.” In his innovative …
German Studies
June 17, 2019
News from Germany
The Competition to Control World Communications, 1900-1945
Heidi Tworek
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
In our current moment marred by media monopolies and disinformation campaigns, it is easy to get caught up in the dizzying temporality of the news cycle and think these are …
American Studies
May 28, 2019
Enduring Alliance
A History of NATO and the Postwar Global Order
Timothy Sayle
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization regularly appears in newspapers and political science scholarship. Surprisingly, historians have yet to devote the attention that the organization’s history merits. Timothy A. Sayle, an …
American Studies
May 23, 2019
A Telephone for the World
Iridium, Motorola, and the Making of a Global Age
Martin Collins
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
It’s easy to take for granted that one can pick up a cell phone and call someone on the other side of the planet. But, until very recently, this had …
World Affairs
December 24, 2018
The Postwar Origins of the Global Environment
How the United Nations Built Spaceship Earth
Perrin Selcer
Hosted by Dexter Fergie
Having been born into a world in which people knew about anthropogenic global warming, I grew up in the “global environment.” Although the category “global environment” seems normal, if not …
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